It is often desirable to move trailers without the use of a vehicle, such as when storing a trailer or maneuvering the trailer into a confined space. This is easy to do manually when the trailer is small and unladen, but is burdensome for a large heavy trailer such as a caravan. This is particularly so for elderly caravan enthusiasts who form a high proportion of caravan users.
Caravan movers have been developed which consist of an electric motor which drives a roller. The mover is attached to the chassis of the caravan and when being used, moved into position such that the roller engages a wheel of the caravan and is thus able to provide motive force to the caravan to propel it short distances. For larger caravans it is common to fit a mover to both a left hand and a right hand wheel of the caravan. When not in use the mover is disengaged from the wheel and in some instances removed from the caravan. A mover will typically include a mechanism to easily engage and disengage the wheel, typically operated by a lever or a jack handle.
Known caravan movers are effective in most situations, however as the movers are fixed to the chassis of the caravan and the wheels of a caravan are mounted via a suspension system, the mover and the wheels can move independently of each other.
The mover may unexpectedly disengage from a wheel when there is a large movement in the suspension. Moving a caravan over a kerb or a pot-hole is often sufficient to disengage a mover from a wheel. If such disengagement is transitory the caravan may move in an uncontrolled and dangerous manner. If the disengagement is permanent the user would need to adjust the mover into position again to continue moving the caravan.
A large movement in the suspension may also bring the mover closer to the wheel. If this movement is excessive, undue force is applied to the mover which may permanently damage the mover.
The object of this invention is to provide a trailer mover that operates in a fixed relation to the wheels of a trailer to alleviate the above problems, or at least provides the public with a useful alternative.